Arizona marijuana

Registered medical marijuana patients in Arizona — a state with roughly a third of the population of Florida — consumed more than 19 tons of marijuana last year, according to a report by the Arizona Department of Health Services. That works out to about 40 million joints.

The report provides clues as to how medical marijuana would be consumed in Florida, with a similarly situated pool of retirees but a population of 19.9 million, vs. Arizona’s 6.73 million.

If the average price for marijuana from state-regulated dispensaries is $300 an ounce, it means medical users spent more than $184 million last year acquiring the drug legally, reports the Arizona Daily Star and Tucson.com.

In Arizona, the state reports, there are 77,639 card-holding patients, which works out to 1.15 percent of the population. If the same percentage were to prevail in Florida, the state would have 229,456 registered patients.

That 2010 law allows those with certain specified medical conditions and a doctor’s recommendation to obtain up to 2½ ounces of marijuana every two weeks. Those conditions include glaucoma, seizures, nausea as well as Alzheimer’s disease and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Arizona legalized medical marijuana through a voter initiative in 2010, but the program kicked into a higher gear in 2015, as more growers, processors and retail outlets or dispensaries became established.

In Florida, United for Care confirmed in a Thursday press conference its comprehensive medical marijuana proposal has obtained enough verified signatures to assure that it will be back on the ballot in November of this year as a constitutional amendment.

If ratified by 60 percent of Florida voters, Amendment 2 would enshrine medical marijuana as a right for Florida patients suffering a number of debilitating conditions.

A marijuana legalization campaign is nearing its goal of gathering 150,000 valid signatures to get on the November ballot, reports the Arizona Republic.

Organizers want to join states such as Colorado and Washington in allowing Arizonans 21 or older to purchase up to one ounce of pot and set up a network of licensed shops where the drug could be taxed, according to the Phoenix Business Journal.

In Arizona, unlike Florida, a voter initiative becomes law with a simple majority vote.

In Florida, the only statewide alternative to dealing with the legislature is to win 60 percent approval for a constitutional amendment. And the deadline for collecting nearly 700,000 signatures to get on the ballot is Feb. 1. No adult-use legalization proposals have gathered enough signatures by this looming deadline. The United for Care medical marijuana amendment looks likely to be on the ballot, however.

The Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol is a few thousand signatures short of gathering the 150,642 signatures needed to qualify for the ballot, spokesman Barrett Marson said Wednesday. However, some of those signatures are likely invalid — gathered from people who cannot vote — and the group aims to collect 225,000 signatures, he said.

Arizona has reached a marijuana-legalization milestone, with more than 80,000 people now qualified to legally possess, grow, or sell pot for medicinal purposes, reports Phoenix New Times.

State voters passed the 2010 Medical Marijuana Act by a slim margin, resulting in about 90 dispensaries statewide and an ever-increasing number of patients, caregivers, and registered dispensary agents.

Here are the relevant stats from the Arizona Department of Health Services latest report, which includes totals as of the end of July:

Qualifying patients (adults): 78,830

Caregivers: 597

Qualifying patients (minors): 126

Caregivers (to minor patients): 126

Dispensary agents: 1,972

Total: 81,651

The tallies have risen steadily since the DHS began issuing registration cards in spring 2011. Last year ended with about 65,000 patients. A glance at DHS reports from 2015 shows a steady rise of several thousand more qualified patients each month. There’s no sign the increase will level out.

“Because more dispensaries have opened up, an increase in patients was expected,” says Ryan Hurley, a local attorney who works with dispensaries. “Also the stigma and fear of being a cardholder gets reduced each passing day, particularly when you have mainstream media outlets, CNN’s Sanjay Gupta, extolling the myriad benefits of MMJ. Because of all of this, I expect to see steady measured growth in the number patients over at least the next year or two.”

Sue Sisley, the medical-marijuana researcher exploring whether the plant can help PTSD sufferers, says she’s seen some of the 595 patients who can now legally use marijuana in Arizona for their PTSD — and has seen some benefits already.

TUCSON, AZ — An Arizona court ruling says legalization of medical marijuana means the smell of pot cannot be the only basis for obtaining a search warrant to investigate suspected illegal activity.

“Medical marijuana use pursuant to AMMA is lawful under Arizona law,” said Judge Peter Eckerstrom in the court’s ruling. “Therefore its scent alone does not disclose whether a crime has occurred.”

“Were we to adopt the state’s suggestion that scent alone furnishes probable cause of a crime, medical marijuana patients would become second-class citizens, losing their rights to privacy and security, including privacy within their own homes,” said Eckerstrom.

Ruling that a judge in Tucson shouldn’t have allowed evidence from a search, the state Court of Appeals overturned a man’s convictions on marijuana and child abuse charges.

The man was arrested after police obtained a warrant to search a warehouse after smelling marijuana. Police found pot plants, growing equipment and evidence that a young child lived there.

The ruling Monday said voters’ legalization of possession, cultivation and use of medical marijuana means circumstances other than mere possession now determines whether there’s a legal basis for a search.

Spokesman Ryan Anderson said the Attorney General’s Office is considering whether to appeal.